


met in grief and held together by its mud

by AllegoriesInMediasRes



Series: OT3 AU verse fics [12]
Category: 16th Century CE RPF, Historical RPF, The Tudors (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background Polyamory, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Inspired by Fanfiction, Oneshot, Sisters, Stepfathers and Stepdaughters, Trauma, falling asleep together, fathers and daughters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 13:26:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29100987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AllegoriesInMediasRes/pseuds/AllegoriesInMediasRes
Summary: 1557. AU. Philippa “Pippa” Tudor, youngest of the royal children, doesn’t trust any of her ladies-in-waiting. Her eldest sister Mary and her father Thomas Cromwell step in.Set in mihrsuri's OT3 verse. Warnings for references to past sexual assault and trauma.
Relationships: Anne Boleyn/Thomas Cromwell/Henry VIII of England, Mary I of England & Thomas Cromwell
Series: OT3 AU verse fics [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1874566
Comments: 4
Kudos: 18





	met in grief and held together by its mud

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mihrsuri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mihrsuri/gifts).
  * Inspired by [It's Always Darkest (Before The Dawn)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15885693) by [mihrsuri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mihrsuri/pseuds/mihrsuri). 



> Set in mihrsuri’s OT3 verse. Anne Boleyn, Thomas Cromwell, and Henry VIII have a secret polyamorous relationship from 1536 onwards, with Thomas being the biological father of several of the royal children. Philippa “Pippa” Tudor is the youngest, born in 1547. This oneshot is set in 1557, following an attack on Pippa, and makes references to similar attacks on Mary Tudor and Thomas Cromwell. Warnings for references to past sexual assault and trauma.
> 
> Title taken from the poem “I Named Us Grief” by Nikita Gill.

Pippa doesn’t trust any of her ladies-in-waiting.

At times, she doesn’t want to be touched. Other times, she needs to be held. Tongues whisper of the youngest princess’s volatility -- _just like her father the king_.

For weeks after Thomas Seymour tried to make her his, Mary couldn’t sleep in a bed. She slept in a trundle-pullout, on a chair, on a divan or the floor, or simply not at all. It had taken a month to consummate her marriage to Philip, and even now, she still has nightmares.

And she had been a woman grown at the time, had not been injured, and her ladies had saved her.

Pippa can claim none of the same.

Lord Lionel comes from an acclaimed family, as do Pippa’s ladies who helped abduct her, and their arrests have aroused discontent, and whispers of an insurrection. The threat is small enough that there is no need to evacuate the royal children, but big enough that Father, Anne, and Thomas are all pulled away trying to mediate. Left alone, Pippa had ordered all her ladies from her room and refused any company, but Mary refuses to leave her. 

They while away the afternoon, Mary letting Pippa cling to her and braiding her hair back in a style that Mihrimah brought to court. When Pippa abhors contact, Mary plays on the virginals or lyre, and tells stories of Cat and Ana. Before the attack, Pippa had been sewing herself a new dress in her favorite shade of blue, and her wrists are now too damaged for needlework. Mary finds the half-completed project and continues what Pippa had begun. 

At one point, she hesitantly asks about Thomas Seymour. None of the younger children know the whole truth, but they have heard rumors and whispers over the years, and they know _something_ bad happened to their eldest sister a long time ago. And the last week has taught Pippa enough to guess at what happened.

Mary goes cold at her questions. She doesn’t want to go back to those months and years when Seymour’s fingers burned on her wrists, when she could not rid herself of that tainted feeling and the sense that she had been nothing but a toy for his ambitions. But Mary tells Pippa what will help her to hear, and reassures her that no one in their family has ever blamed Mary or thought ill of her.

By this point, they are sitting on the floor with their backs against the wall. Pippa’s face relaxes at Mary’s words, and eventually her head rests in Mary’s lap. Her eyes fall closed, and Mary gazes upon her face, thin eyebrows knitted together under a mess of black curls. She runs her fingers through her sleeping sister’s hair, and leaning her head against the wall, Mary finally allows herself to weep softly, and realizes anew just what a service Thomas Cromwell rendered her fifteen years ago.

* * *

Thomas shuffles along the corridors to Pippa’s chambers, his shoulders hunched forward with weariness and some measure of loneliness. Henry and Anne had been dead on their feet after handling the small skirmish and pacifying the angry nobles, and had gone right to bed before they could take some time to discuss the day’s events. He understood, of course -- it is difficult for all of them to know that their youngest has been so vilely abused, and to have to convince others of that fact.

But Lord Lionel’s treachery strikes at Thomas’s heart in a way it does not for Henry and Anne, because it brings back memories of Norwich. One of the reasons Thomas sought so much power was that he knew he would be _safe_. Closeness to royalty has its advantages, and one of those is protection. Foolishly, he had thought he would be shielded from the John Norwiches and Thomas Seymours and Lord Lionels of the world, but he had been so wrong. Like a child, he had thought it would be all over. 

He feels the weight of his failure with every step.

All he can be thankful for is that Pippa is in much better hands than he was at age ten, and that she shall see justice done right away. 

He arrives at the door to her room, where he confers briefly with the guards. Unhappily, he reports that Pippa had ordered all her ladies away shortly after the midday meal. Thomas is ashamed that she has spent the whole day alone, and gestures for the guards to open the door. He enters quietly. 

His first view of the chamber reveals nobody, but he hears soft breathing. Thomas steps around the bed, and then he sees Pippa sprawled on the floor. She is curled in on herself, but he can still see the bruises on her wrists. She rests her head in Mary’s lap.

Near them, he can see a lyre and various swathes of cloth laid out in Pippa’s favorite shade of blue -- a dress she had been working on, before everything. The top half of her hair is braided back with three plaits, an updo that he recalls Mihrimah favoring. 

Mary is slumped against the wall, looking as exhausted as Henry and Anne had been. She seems as though sleep had claimed her, rather than her going to sleep. She drowsed off in an awkward position, and now she is half-leaning in one direction, in danger of crumpling onto her right hip.

Automatically, Thomas moves towards her, one hand outstretched, before he pauses. The years have improved much between him and Mary, but physical contact is a realm they have never crossed. He considers rousing her, but a look at the dark circles under her eyes dissuades him. 

Gradually, gently, with light touches on her shoulder, he eases her onto the ground. She snuffles in her sleep, but she does not wake, and he places a pillow from the bed underneath her head, before she hits the ground.

Her sleeping posture is still unwieldy: her legs remain stretched out flat, pillowing Pippa’s head, while her torso is turned over onto the ground. She lies almost at a right angle, and Thomas muses how to coax her into something more comfortable.

Suddenly, Mary shifts. Thomas’s heart thunders in his teeth. 

She slides her legs from under her sister, curling into a more natural position. Pippa shifts with her, moving backwards and snuggling into Mary’s form, seeking her warmth. She ends up with her head tucked under Mary’s chin. 

Thomas watches them. Mary’s Tudor-red locks, streaked with gray, tangle in Pippa’s dark curls. He brushes Pippa’s hair out of her face, and after hesitating, he does the same for Mary. Pippa hates having her hair in her face, and despite the thirty years between them and no shared blood, his oldest and youngest are much in each other’s mold. 

He pulls several blankets from the bed and drapes one over the sisters. With the other ones, he makes himself a nest on the floor. The rug is soft enough that he does not need to wake them to slip sheets beneath them. He lays himself down, Pippa in between him and Mary. Thomas takes Pippa’s hand in his and falls asleep with his thumb brushing over the chain-remnants.


End file.
